Incubating eggs cold to the touch

[Dani2daL]

Had a broody hen that was sitting on several eggs at different stages of development. When candled, some were tiny little embryos moving and a few were ready to hatch. We had 4 to hatch but they all died. I think the mama pecked them or stomped them. Idk. Anyways, we bought an incubator and put the rest in it for two reasons: we didn’t want anymore to die if hatched and she also stopped sitting on them. The incubator read between 99-101°, however, the eggs always felt cool to the touch. I know one of the 5 didn’t make it because it exploded in the incubator. You could tell that it was halfway developed. I guess it died halfway through…probably when the broody hen decided to not sit on the eggs anymore. I floated the remainder of the eggs and all of them sank so I guess they are all dead or rotten. My main question is—is it normal for incubator eggs to feel cool to the touch? Cool as or cooler than room temp? (My house is 71° most of the time). I think I got a bad incubator. This was my first unprepared attempt to hatch chicks—meaning I didn’t expect this to happen and we just went with it to see if we would get some chicks. We have learned a whole lot this go round so we know exactly what to do next time. I hate it was just such a failure.

 

[yakitori]

Which incubator did you get? you should always have an extra calibrated thermometer and hygrometer in ther to double check the parameters. Incubator thermometers can be grossly off the mark...

Next time you can do a sniff test on your eggs. That way you will know it’s bad long before it explodes.

 

[Hilltop Flock]

They should feel warm to the touch. It’s really not much difference between body temp and incubating temp; it can be hard to discern w/o a thermometer. Does your incubator have a built in thermo already? A second is always a good bet.

 

[BelovedBirds]

Had a broody hen that was sitting on several eggs at different stages of development. When candled, some were tiny little embryos moving and a few were ready to hatch. We had 4 to hatch but they all died. I think the mama pecked them or stomped them. Idk. Anyways, we bought an incubator and put the rest in it for two reasons: we didn’t want anymore to die if hatched and she also stopped sitting on them. The incubator read between 99-101°, however, the eggs always felt cool to the touch. I know one of the 5 didn’t make it because it exploded in the incubator. You could tell that it was halfway developed. I guess it died halfway through…probably when the broody hen decided to not sit on the eggs anymore. I floated the remainder of the eggs and all of them sank so I guess they are all dead or rotten. My main question is—is it normal for incubator eggs to feel cool to the touch? Cool as or cooler than room temp? (My house is 71° most of the time). I think I got a bad incubator. This was my first unprepared attempt to hatch chicks—meaning I didn’t expect this to happen and we just went with it to see if we would get some chicks. We have learned a whole lot this go round so we know exactly what to do next time. I hate it was just such a failure.

rotten eggs don't sink, they float. Fresh eggs sink, rotten eggs float, in the later stage of incubation, developing eggs will float, and the only way to tell if alive, is if they move about.